VICON, developer of Academy Award-winning
motion capture systems, announced today the launch of the FKextreme system,
catering specifically to game developers and small studios. FKextreme will
be introduced at the Game Developers Conference, Booth 354 WH, March 7-9,
2007 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, Calif.
"There has been a perception in the marketplace that VICON motion capture
is out of reach of small to mid-sized animation facilities and game
developers. FKextreme is an incredibly affordable and accessible motion
capture system that delivers better price performance than any other
professional mo-cap system targeting these customers," explained Robin
Pengelly, Business Development Manager, VICON Entertainment. "Over recent
years a number of low-cost systems have been released, but they have
significant limitations and technical roadblocks for production use. Vicon
has taken our flagship system and pipeline and brought the price within the
reach of small studios and first-time game producers. "

With an extensive amount of new camera engineering and a simplified,
user-friendly software interface, FKextreme delivers incredible price
performance in a setup comprised of VICON's MX3+ cameras, new processing
software and a full customer support package. The software component
contains all of the underlying power of VICON's robust architecture, in a
new graphical user interface (GUI) that takes the user step-by-step through
the process of running a motion capture system.

"This new software interface is very appealing to first time users, because
ultra high-end motion capture can seem a bit daunting. However, the same
GUI can be easily customized by someone experienced in motion capture who
wants to design their own specific interface and workflow," continued
Pengelly.

Changes have been made to the design of the VICON MX3+ cameras to
significantly increase their performance metrics. Along with the new
software interface, a sophisticated plug-in suite for many 3d packages
including the popular Autodesk MotionBuilder allows true cinematic
workflows. Real-time pre-visualization is now available in a simple
point-and-click environment. The plug-in also enables skeletal data to be
transferred from multiple characters and layered in real-time via a live
remote control interface to essentially use MotionBuilder as an
animation-recording tool.

The new FKextreme system is ideally suited to small to mid-sized game
development and animation facilities and is great for capturing both
in-game motions and cinematic sequences with up to two performers. The
benefits of the latest VICON system are that while incredibly powerful, it
is also fully extensible for facilities that aim to expand into multiple
performer capture sessions with high degrees of interaction between
characters.

The new VICON FKextreme Motion Capture system is based on the same VICON
motion capture technology in place at world-leading game developers
including Electronic Arts, Sony, Computer Entertainment of America,
Activision, Ubisoft, Microsoft Games, Midway Games, Square, Capcom, Konami,
NAMCO, Nintendo, Sega and top film effects studios including Industrial
Light & Magic, Sony Pictures Imageworks, Animal Logic, Rhythm & Hues and
many others.

www.vicon.com